


A New Tide In An Old Bottle

by missmungoe



Category: One Piece
Genre: F/M, Family, Fluff and Hurt/Comfort, Marriage
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-30
Updated: 2017-06-30
Packaged: 2018-11-20 23:39:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,562
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11345520
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/missmungoe/pseuds/missmungoe
Summary: It's always been him, coming home to her—has always been her, waiting. But she's tired of waiting, of enduring so many seas of distance, and so when he can't come back to her—"Take me with you," Makino tells Garp, no patience left for waiting, or for refusal, "to the New World."





	A New Tide In An Old Bottle

**Author's Note:**

> Another flower prompt fill from tumblr. Prompt asked for "impatiens" (impatience).

Her patience has a limit.

It’s not the end-of-the-line sort of limit; no border to be toed or crossed, and no cup to be filled and filled, until it finally runs over. In fact, it’s nothing that takes filling. Instead, patience is what fills her, a whole ocean’s worth, all of it contained within her.

It’s not an always-quiet thing, that ocean, and she’s familiar with the changing tides and restless eddies; knows the depths of her soul’s sea well, even if she’s never once stepped off the docks of her little port, to brave the one stretching beyond it. But she knows herself, knows that she has little patience for sitting on her hands, and that she likes to be busy and to have things to do, glasses to polish and bottles to stack. She knows she can’t endure leaving a book unfinished, if it’s claimed her—that she can barely resist reading ahead of herself if the temptation has taken root. And she’s not a patient lover, Makino knows, too-eager hands and imploring touches wanting all of him at once.

 _He_  is, though—patient, which is an incongruous thing, his whole personality considered. But it’s their little quirk, their private joke of subverted expectations, and there’s always laughter where they come together, her patience tested and his smiles full of cheek, his touches knowing. He’s always loved loving her.

Her patience has a limit, and he likes to test it with touches, but he’s never derived enjoyment from keeping her waiting, Makino knows, although it’s never cost her much to endure the distance; the seas between them. She’s never minded waiting for him to come home.

Until one day, when he doesn’t.

The war ends and the sea settles, but it’s not her husband who comes back, it’s Garp, her almost-father, her closest-thing-to, every time greyer than the last, wearied brow hewn from too many years, too many losses, and the first beginnings of grief finds her even before he’s stepped off the gangway.

But—“He’s alive,” he tells her, before Makino has even had the chance to ask, but she doesn’t have time to feel relief, even as it rushes out of her. And Garp doesn’t wait to continue, adding, “He’s in no shape to go anywhere, though.” Then, gravely, “Condition still wasn’t stable, last I heard.”

It’s about as blunt as she’d expect from Garp, but it’s still kinder than what he might have offered; than what he _would_ have offered, had it been anyone else asking, although she hasn’t asked with words, but her face says everything, Makino knows. It always does.

But she doesn’t know if it’s a mercy, the deliberate vagueness, and she doesn’t know if she wants to ask, just how bad it must be, whatever it is that’s keeping her husband down—the man who’d been back on his feet only days after his amputation, who’d kissed her fretting fingers and told her he’d only consent to forced bed rest if she joined him.

She doesn’t ask, and Garp doesn’t say anything else. And she’s prepared to be patient—is prepared to steel her heart, to ask instead  _how long_ , and to brace herself for the coming weeks, and the familiar helplessness that comes with being the land-bound tether to a seafaring heart—when something within her rears back, suddenly unwilling.

It’s always been him, coming home to her—has always been her, waiting, nothing else for her to do but to keep living, and tending the soil of her quiet, portside life. But suddenly it’s been  _too long,_ too many months and too many things missed; their son crawling, then walking, and his small, wordless vocabulary of sounds and laughter growing, and she’s  _missed_  him, like she’s been missing a part of herself, a part of her soul.

And all at once, her long-held patience trickles out; the whole ocean’s worth of it within her, every last drop, to nothing.

She looks at Garp then, her closest-thing-to, her almost-father, but the  _almost_  doesn’t matter, because families are wrought from sea-surf, from sun and saltwater, not just from blood; and it doesn’t matter that she went and married a pirate, and that Garp never approved. What matters is the way he’s looking at her, and the baby on her hip, small cheek pressed to her shoulder and his red hair bright under the sinking sun.

“Then take me with you,” Makino says, doesn’t ask but  _demands_ , soft hands wrapped around the tether to her heart like a ship’s rope, the burn rubbing her skin raw, but she doesn’t flinch, even as Garp’s brows lift and she adds, voice firm and her grip around her son unyielding—

“To the New World.”

 

—

 

“Hey, Doc—”

“No.”

“C’mon—”

“No.”

“Just hear me out—”

“Tell him, Ben,” Doc says, without looking up from the task in front of him, hands busy sterilising his surgical instruments, and the rest of him busy ignoring the pout directed at him from the cabin’s only cot.

Leaned back in his chair, Ben’s gaze is on the newspaper in his lap. “If you move from that bunk, we’re mutinying you, and you’ll spend the rest of your recovery in the brig.” He flicks his eyes to Shanks, then flips a page, as though for emphasis. “Shouldn’t be hard. In the state you’re in, a nudge would topple you like a tree.”

Rising from his seat, his hands wiped dry on a rag, “If he tries anything,” Doc says, with a look at Ben, then at Shanks, “just knock him out. He could use the rest.” Then under his breath, “And so could the rest of us.”

“Roger that,” Ben says, ignoring Shanks’ indignant splutter.

Doc makes his retreat, the door to the cabin closing behind him, shutting off the sunlight that had momentarily crept across the threshold, and throwing the cabin back under a veil of muted shadows, dust motes dancing in the wan shaft of light spilling in through the porthole.

Restless beyond bearing, Shanks drops his head back against the pillow with an exaggerated sigh—and regrets it a second later, when the action has pain erupting across his chest.

Ben doesn’t lift his gaze from the paper, and Shanks lets his glare slip when it’s clear his efforts are going unnoticed, although the smile sitting at the corner of Ben’s mouth suggests the opposite. “You’re deriving way too much pleasure from this.”

Ben hums, eyes on the article open in front of him. From his vantage point, Shanks can’t tell what it’s about. “We all have our vices, Boss.”

“ _Vices_ ,” Shanks mutters. “Sadistic old bag. I just want to stretch my legs. I’m going stir-crazy here—it’s been over a week!”

“Of which you’ve been conscious less than two days,” comes the smooth retort, punctuated by the turn of another page.

There’s a protest on his tongue, some cheeky rebuttal about his presence having been missed, no matter what Ben’s lamentations suggest, but the drawn and tired shadows under his best friend’s eyes make him think twice about speaking it. The remark seems suddenly redundant, and not at all humorous.

No injury in his memory has ever kept him down this long, not even his amputation. And he doesn’t like to think about it, the days that have gone missing in the in-between, although going by the amount of pain he’s in now, Shanks doubts being awake to endure them would have been kinder, at least not for him. His crew, though, is another matter.

And what’s more—“Did you call her?” Shanks asks, after a lull.

He doesn’t like the furrow that settles between Ben’s eyes at the question, near-imperceptible as it is, but, “I did,” he says, evenly. He’s very pointedly not looking at Shanks now. “She didn’t pick up.”

Something cinches tight around his heart, the ache slipping beneath the one already there, the steady throb of his still-healing wounds, dulled by painkillers and layered with enough bandages that Shanks has the morbid thought to ask if they’re all that’s holding him together. From the hell they’re giving him, it certainly feels like it.

“She’s probably busy,” Ben says then, and the fact that he says anything at all tells Shanks enough; tells him that he’s not the only one finding the silence strange, and unlike her. “She has a bar to run. And your boy will be walking by now. If he’s like you, she probably has her hands full. And she’s got two of them.”

He feels the sting of regret, another ache piling on top of all the others, and it wasn’t meant unkindly, Shanks knows, but the reminder still hurts, like it hurts just thinking about the fact that he’d been so close to never seeing his family again, let alone how much his son has grown.

He considers the ceiling of his cabin, restlessness spreading, like an itch under his bandages. And he wants to point out that it’s not a very good excuse, to say that Ben knows as well as Shanks does that Makino keeps the Den Den Mushi downstairs when she works, just in case. But he can’t think of an alternative explanation for her silence, at least not one that doesn’t make him want to push off the bunk and make the call himself, as though it will somehow make a difference.

He’s about to ask Ben to try again when the door to his cabin swinging open halts the words on his tongue, and, “Hey,” Luffy says around a mouthful of food, head poking through the doorway. “Nami spotted a ship.”

“That’s not from our larder, is it?” Shanks asks.

Luffy glances at the cut of meat in his hand, as though just now noticing it. Then with a grinning shrug, “Maybe. It’s good!”

“Is anyone running this ship in my absence?” Shanks asks Ben with a sigh.

“You ask that like you’re the one usually in charge of running it,” Ben says.

“I’m the captain. I maintain a presence of authority and command necessary for this crew to function.”

“And the larder?”

“Is usually filled. What’s your point?”

Ben gives him a look. “Are you the one filling it?”

“I leave the occasional note in the kitchen outlining what’s missing for our supply list.”

“You mean the yellow post-its that say ‘booze’ in capital letters?”

“You’re welcome,” Shanks chirps.

Another shape in the doorway then—Luffy’s navigator, looking a little exasperated. “There you are,” she says, huffing a breath. “Did you tell them?” Gaze shifting to the cutlet in his hand, her brows draw together, and the look she gives him is in uncanny mimicry of Ben’s best. “Whose larder is that from?”

The look he gives Ben is ignored, but Luffy only shrugs, and takes another grinning bite, and, “Hey,” Shanks says then, addressing the navigator. “What was that about a ship?”

“Oh—yeah,” Luffy says, before the girl can answer, mouth full of food again. “It’s gramps.”

Shanks stares. Then to Ben, “He’s finally come for my head. To strike when I’m at my lowest.”

Ben hums, attention once again on the newspaper. “All he’d need to do would be to show up when you’ve been on a drinking binge. But I guess this works, too.”

Sticking his tongue out, Shanks directs his next remark at Luffy, “Maybe it’s not me he’s after. Maybe he’s here for you.”

Luffy blinks. “I haven’t done anything.”

Nami snorts. “When have you ever not done something? You just usurped an Emperor.” She gestures to Shanks. “Almost two!”

“ _Hey_ ,” Shanks says, affronted. “Uncalled for. I’m not dead yet—I remain very much un-usurped.” A glance at Ben. “Unless you’re planning something.”

“Could be,” Ben says. “I think I’d like to be the one writing the post-its, for once.”

“Come on, Ben. You know that would still be me.”

He gets a sigh for that, and with a grin, lifts his eyes back to the two in the doorway. “But speaking of Garp,” he says to Luffy. “You did run off to be a pirate. And you’re well on your way to being the king of them all. He should have some objections to that. One, at the very least.”

“Oh, yeah he’s already kicked my ass for that,” Luffy says, cheerfully. “It’s bridge-water.”

Shanks blinks. “What?”

“I think he means it’s water under the bridge,” Ben supplies.

“Ah, right!” Luffy laughs. The girl at his side suffocates a sigh with her palm. “That thing.”

“And don’t forget that Garp blames you for that influence,” Ben says to Shanks, tone musing. “You’re also the one who married the closest thing he has to a daughter,” he adds. “Without asking for his permission first. Or inviting him to the wedding.”

“I feel I should remind you that I wouldn’t have survived that wedding if I had,” Shanks counters. “I’d have made her a wife and a widow in one fell swoop.”

Ben shrugs. “Would have been good entertainment for the reception.”

“You mean Makino drunk off her ass wasn’t entertainment enough?”

The well-visited memory finds him with a surge of longing, enough that it leaves him a little breathless, the evening sun bleeding gold into the sea, and her laughter, light and tipsy. And he has the urge to tell Ben to get the Den Den Mushi so he can make the call himself, needing suddenly to hear her voice.

A smile lifts one corner of Ben’s mouth. “I’d advise you not to mention that to Garp. You’ve been a bad enough influence without teaching her to drink.”

“Hey, she can down a shot like a pro now,” Shanks says, and with a wince, “But yeah, I could probably do without telling Garp that particular detail.”

Footsteps then, and, “Why are we all gathering here?” Usopp is asking, coming to a stop in the crowded doorway. “Are we having another party?”

Shanks is about to answer, but, “Wait— _another_  party?” Ben ignores his wounded expression. “Did you have one without me?”

“You were missed,” Ben deadpans, and Shanks would have called him out on his cheek, but remembers then, the days he’d been out. Doc’s poorly concealed relief when he’d dragged himself into consciousness through so much agony, it had almost pulled him back under. The chairs that had been pulled up next to his bunk, only one left now, but there’d been more, all silent testaments to a vigil kept through long hours, and longer days.

He thinks of the crew having lingered, for no other reason than to see through his recovery, and Roger’s hat the first sight that had greeted him upon waking.

“Some nursemaid you are,” Shanks grumbles instead. “And isn’t this where you’re supposed to say that the invalid needs rest? No visitors?”

Ben flips a page. “You should enjoy the company while you can. Who knows what Garp has in mind.”

“Do you have to say that so  _cheerfully_?”

Ben looks at him, expression blank. “I feel for you, Boss.” Another page, flipped calmly.

Shanks throws a glance to the gathering crowd in the doorway. “He’s your grandfather,” he tells Luffy, tone half-accusatory. “Can’t you deal with him?”

“Isn’t he basically your father-in-law?” Usopp asks. “That’s what dad said.”

“Kid has a point,” Ben says, before Shanks can protest.

Usopp nods, and to Nami, “Hey, there’s a betting pool, if you want to get in on that.”

“Oh!” she says brightly, expression lighting up. “How big is it?”

Shanks looks at Ben, expression imploring. “Now would be an excellent time to stage that mutiny. Toss me in the brig, then  _you_  can deal with him.”

A commotion on the deck outside then, and Ben looks up from the newspaper. “Too late for that now.”

“Please let me get off the bunk, at least. If death is what awaits me, I’d like to face it standing.”

Ben gives him a look that tells Shanks plainly his chances aren’t much better on his feet, but yields with a sigh. “Fine. But if you topple, I’m not catching you.”

“Don’t tease me, Ben—you know I’ll swoon just to prove you wrong.”

Ben shakes his head, but when Shanks makes to push himself off the bunk, there’s a steady hand under his elbow, and he’s glad when Ben doesn’t mention how long it takes just to get him standing. And he might have had another joke at his own expense ready, if it hadn’t been for Ben’s silence, that all-too-telling thing that speaks volumes of what’s been going on while he’s been unconscious.

And he doesn’t captain a pessimistic crew, but it was a close call. Every dizzying ache, and the exhaustion that’s come to settle in his bones, marrow-deep, is testament enough to that. It feels like it takes everything he has just to breathe, and breezy talk of mutiny notwithstanding, Shanks wonders how many of them had thought he wouldn’t make it.

He’s suddenly glad Ben hasn’t had the chance to get a hold of Makino.

He takes one step, then drags a breath through his nose. Ben has let go of his elbow, although he hasn’t stepped back, and Luffy lingers by the door, snack discarded and an offer of assistance that isn’t put into words, but that’s implied, anyway.

Shanks is grateful for the small independence. He’s never liked being bedridden, or dependent on others’ time and patience. But their responses spark a strange longing, for her small hands that wouldn’t have stopped fretting, not for one moment, ignoring his protests, half-hearted as they would have been under her ministrations. Because it’s different, enduring the attentions of a heart like that; one that has endless patience for loving him, but none for his obstinacy.

He misses her then, and fiercely, enough that he has to stop for breath, before pushing forward towards the door. But if either of them notice, Shanks suspects they’ll chalk it up to his injuries, and not the ache that sits, much deeper in his chest.

“You okay, Shanks?” Luffy asks, and Shanks would have waved him off, if he’d had the strength to lift his arm above waist-level.

“Never felt better,” he grinds out, and it takes effort, dragging his usual cheek to the surface, to soften the words. Then, with a look of feigned accusation, “But on that note, how are you so  _perky_? You took a beating in that fight, too. Unless I imagined that. Seeing as most of my blood was outside my body when you stepped in, that’s entirely possible.”

He remembers little of the battle, beyond the fleeting thought that it would be his last. And he hasn’t had the chance to ask what happened to Teach, but finds that he doesn’t really need to know. The scars on his brow hurt the least of all his wounds, old and new, and that’s something, Shanks thinks, even if it’s likely just a psychosomatic thing.

“I did,” Luffy says simply. Then with a shrug, “I’m better now.”

The laugh that pulls from him is a rasping wheeze, nothing like what it should sound like, but everything hurts, and it’s all he can manage. “See now, I laugh, but I’m crying inside.” Then to Ben, “God, to have the constitution of a twenty-year-old.”

Ben gives a grunt of agreement, and Luffy only grins.

The deck greets him with a sun so bright it feels like an onslaught, the white-hot glare like a particularly vicious hangover slamming down against his skull, and there’s a groan at the back of his tongue in the shape of an oath. His eyes are swimming, tears burning at the corners, but he pushes forward in spite of it. Because he might not have the constitution of a twenty-year-old, but the stubbornness in him is too young for his years, the one that has no care for his wounds, and that’s reared up in preparation for the man who’s sought him out.

He doesn’t question why he’s come, because Garp might not be Makino’s father by blood, but it’s not in blood but sentiment that family exists, Shanks knows. And he’s had a year of experience now, learning what it means to be a father—had felt the beginnings of that knowledge stirring already twelve years ago, for a kid who wasn’t even his but who might as well be, by that too-bright pride within him that feels like it should belong to another man.

And maybe Dragon feels it, in some measure or shape, but it’s Shanks’ too. And they have a common ground there, him and Garp, almost-fathers that they are, although he suspects Garp wouldn’t take too kindly to the comparison, given the implication that accompanies it.

 _Almost-son-in-law_ , and Roger would have laughed himself to tears just at the suggestion.

“If this ends badly,” he tells Ben, coming to stand at his shoulder, but at least Shanks is allowed to stand on his own without assistance, although it’s taking most of his strength just to manage that, “tell my wife I love her.”

“Melodrama will kill you before your injuries,” Ben says, gaze fixed on the ship that’s pulled up beside theirs, no navy trappings on it now, but it’s still noticeably Garp’s.

But it’s not Garp who steps off the ship.

Or—it’s not  _just_  Garp.

“Or your wife will,” Ben says, naked surprise slipping into his voice as the small figure steps onto the deck, Garp in tow, and Shanks would recognise it anywhere, even squinting through the sunlight. Because he knows those shoulders—knows the lift of that chin, and the dark hair framing her face, and the sight of her shoves all thoughts of the previously mentioned injuries so far to the back of his mind, the rest of it is left curiously blank.

“Well, shit,” Yasopp laughs, sounding almost breathless. “I pitched my bets in the wrong pool for this reunion.”

The sun makes sea-glass of her hair, coaxing out the green in it, and everything about her looks bright—even her eyes, the dark soil flecked with brown-gold that he knows better than his own, sitting endless above pale cheeks flushed with a truly brilliant sunburn.

And he’s never once seen her off the Fuschia docks—had teased her once that he could sooner convince a tree to uproot itself from the earth. But she’s there, clear as day, even as the sight of her beggars belief.

“Is it the meds?” he asks Ben, still wearing his surprise without pretence. And that itself is a small marvel, although it doesn’t really help, insofar as coming to terms with what’s in front of him. “I’m not the only one seeing her, right?”

Ben has no answer for him, but going by the reactions of the rest of his crew, Shanks isn’t the only one seeing her, here, on his ship,  _on this sea,_  and there’s a moment where he feels removed beyond himself, beyond his ailments and his whole body, and if he’d had his mind with him he might have warned Ben that swooning felt suddenly like a very real possibility.

That dark gaze fixes on his—claims it, and then she’s striding towards him, steps short and hurried, before something halts her in her tracks, just two short paces away.

And it’s closer than she’s been in nine months, the whole of her suddenly within reach, but he can’t will his hand to lift, to reach for her; can’t will his body to move so much as a step. He has the vague thought that he should probably be breathing.

The whole deck is quiet, the hush of stunned silence so profound Shanks wonders if he’s gone momentarily deaf, but then—“I was tired of waiting,” Makino says, matter-of-fact, as though daring him to contradict her, or to offer any kind of comment, even if all he’s managed is to open his mouth, anything he might have said, earnest or clever, having fled his mind at the sound of her voice.

She’s looking at him, gaze lingering a moment on the bandages—on the battered body keeping him upright, and barely—so many different things passing over her face he can barely keep up, and the whole ship seems to hold its breath along with him.

“I get seasick,” she blurts then, seeking his eyes, and there are tears running down her cheeks now, but she sounds angry, Shanks thinks, and doesn’t know if he’s more baffled at that, or the fact that she’s _there_ , but isn’t given the chance to offer his thoughts on either, when Makino forges on. “Really,  _violently_ seasick. I just thought you should know. Also, everything is tilting, all the time, like I’m constantly a little bit drunk, which explains a lot, you know, about you, and I would find it a little funnier, except that I haven’t really slept in a week, because this sea won’t stay still long enough to let me. But oh, do you know who happens to really like sailing? Our son, nevermind the cyclones, or the sea kings.”

She laughs, a breathless, high-pitched sound that quavers on the edge of breaking. “And there are _so many sea kings._  Why are there so many sea kings? I’ve only seen one in my whole life, and that was one more than I ever needed to see, and I can’t believe anyone would ever want to willingly  _sail_  here,” she says, the words rushing out, not even a pause for breath, before her voice breaks, cracks right down the middle with a wet sob, “And what are you doing out of _bed—_ ”

He’s moving before he’s had the chance to remember that everything hurts, no mind to spare the pain, or his crew, or even Garp, and he’s reached her in two strides, the first banishing the distance and the second seeing her enclosed by his arm, her next sob muffled against his throat. And the breath that finally drags from his chest caves it, the rest of his body following suit, but she’s there to catch him, solid and unwavering, uprooted as she is with sea under her feet.

She smells of salt, the thought finds him—of sea-spray and open air, of his whole world and everything in it, but with the feel of her against him, small and soft-limbed but steady, despite the fretting hands shaking at his back, Shanks wonders how he ever thought that the latter has ever been anything but her.

And this isn’t how they usually do it, her waiting, him returning, the Fuschia docks always the point where their worlds merge, the sea sweeping in to break against the shore, impatience in her kisses where his laughter meets them, but no reproach for having kept her waiting.

He feels her reproach now, hands gripping his shirt and her sobs hard, damning things, and he’s no closer to mustering a single word, finding it difficult to speak past the feeling pushing up his chest, and the sound that falls against her ear has no name, not even hers.

The hand buried in her hair is shaking. It’s loose, free of her usual kerchief, and he drags his fingers through it where it falls down her back, warmed by the sun. And she doesn’t come apart under his touch; is as real as he is, however improbable her presence, and Shanks doubts she’s surprised that the first words that come to him are what they are.

“Is Garp going to punch my lights out if I kiss you?”

The laugh that breaks through her tears is lovelier than he remembers, and, “Probably,” Makino says, the word muffled against his chest. “Are you going to let that stop you?”

His answer is to draw back, enough to look at her, hair loose and her sunburned cheeks, freckles by her temples and her eyes darker than he’s ever seen them. And he doesn’t pause for breath, seeking her mouth instead, and  _there_ is her impatience, the one he’s familiar with, sitting in the hands curled around the back of his neck and the press of her against him, a paradox of tenderness and reckless insistence that has him laughing into the kiss.

“A thousand says Garp clocks him,” someone _sobs_ , the counter-offer to which is lost in a blubbering laugh that ripples across the deck.

He’s grinning so badly he can barely kiss her right, and it’s as public as it gets, two crews and one almost-father, and she’s always been fiercely private in her affections, but she’s the one pushing into him now, and the tables have turned so violently he’s still reeling from it.

And he really is in no shape to be out of bed, let alone necking like he’s twenty and his life depends on it, but there and then, having her suddenly after nine months without her, Shanks has the sudden feeling that it’s never depended on anything quite as much.

A small laugh sounds then—a bright, happy giggle from further down the deck that makes his heart stutter in his chest, and when the kiss breaks he finds his son; a different boy than when Shanks saw him last, but unmistakably  _his_ , hair too unapologetically red and smile too wide to be anyone else’s.

“Somewhere,” Garp sighs, gaze studiously fixed on the rolled-up sails above, the smiling baby on his arm cheerfully unaware of his grandfather’s grievances, “Roger is laughing too hard to remember that he’s dead.”

The laugh that drags from him is so startled it hurts—shit, it hurts to breathe, every muscle in his whole body protesting every breath. And he might have escaped death by a hairsbreadth, might still be sailing perilously close, but it’s difficult to remember, when he can’t think of a time he’s ever felt this alive.

He looks at Makino, salt in her hair, on her skin, and that small defiance from her earlier outburst still sitting in the press of her mouth, loosening into a wavering smile when he touches his thumb to one corner. “That’ll teach me to keep you waiting,” Shanks says. He catches the tear that escapes, quick and clear down a sun-reddened cheek. “Although I can’t say I’m all that upset by the turn of events.”

The trembling smile breaks into a grin that looks to be in spite of herself, and, “I’ve been throwing up for a week straight,” Makino tells him, as though in answer—then with a sob, “I  _hate_  sailing.”

His own grin is so wide it hurts, one small ache among countless others. But her eyes are bright, her face baring all her feelings, and he thinks then, recklessly, that he doesn’t care if Garp really does punch his lights out, but before he can reach for her again he’s beaten to the punch—

_“Makino!”_

Her grip on him slips, and then her arms are full of wiry, too-long limbs, and Luffy, who was never hers either but who might as well be, but Shanks finds he doesn’t mind the small usurping, hearing her loud, startled laugh, and, “When did you get so  _tall_?”

“Luffy!” comes the navigator’s indignant shout from further down the deck. “Give them a minute, jeez.”

Grinning, Shanks turns to Garp, standing off to the side, disapproving glare firmly in place, but the effect is ruined somewhat by the baby slobbering all over his shirt.

“Red-Hair,” Garp says, ignoring the insistent tugging at his beard; an old, military dignity that wavers only a fraction when the baby lets out a soft, elated  _coo_.

“Garp,” Shanks says, eyes on his son, and finds himself suddenly at a loss.

He doesn’t reach to take him, barely trusting his strength to hold himself up, let alone his son, but he touches shaking fingers to a small foot, kicking back eagerly. Another solid truth, and he’s still trying to convince his mind to catch up with nine months of growth and changes; to reconcile the smiling baby on Garp’s arm with the one he remembers, barely a few months old when he’d left, a perfect fit for the crook of his arm.

But even as he struggles, the realisation finds him, a more chilling thought than before, that he’d been so close to missing everything.

“Still kicking, I see,” Garp says then, as though in answer to his thoughts, and Shanks catches the shift of that hard gaze to the bandages holding him together, and doesn’t doubt that he looks like he just rolled out of his deathbed. And he has no idea who even told Garp, but knows it must be the reason for his turning up; knows he wouldn’t have risked bringing them all this way, to this sea, for a few petty wounds.

“You brought them,” Shanks says, looking at the old marine, long-retired and in cheerful floral civvies, but the frown of disapproval worn like heavy, navy regalia.

And yet he’s on a pirate ship, with a pirate for a grandson, another for an almost-son-in-law, and so many things in Garp’s life amounts to pirates, Shanks is almost tempted to point it out, even if all it’s likely to earn him is a fist to the face.

From the wry quirk of Garp’s brows, the fact hasn’t escaped him, and with a glance at Makino, “It’s what you do for family,” he says at length, the words trying very hard to be ambiguous, but falling short of the mark, and Shanks can’t help the grin, or the tears, but it doesn’t matter what Garp thinks. At least, not about that.

As though to salvage some of his disapproval, Garp’s eyes narrow in a familiar glare. “You’re still a damn cheeky crook.”

Shanks laughs. “Yeah.” Then, with all of his gratitude, and none of his cheek, “Thank you, Garp.”

Still glaring, Garp just looks at him, then at Makino, out of Luffy’s grip but with a whole crew at her hands now, too many arms reaching, and, “She wasn’t lying,” he says then, dryly. “She’s been throwing up since we left East Blue.” And his next look lacks the hard note Shanks has come to expect when he adds, “Guess your sorry ass was worth it.”

Shanks doesn’t point out that Garp must have agreed to the sentiment, at least to some extent, to have brought her with him in the first place, but wisely keeps the observation to himself.

“The things you do for family,” he says instead. The little foot in his hand kicks, small toes curling against his palm, and the smile that greets him is a little uncanny, it’s so like his own.

From the dry, enduring look on Garp’s face, the resemblance hasn’t escaped him, either.

A touch against his back then, and Makino is there, freed from the crew’s attentions. And it’s still a feat, accepting it—the her-being-there, but she’s tangible, a still-solid warmth against his side, her feet just a little unsteady on the planks.

“Still seasick?” Shanks asks, and tries very hard not to let his full delight show. He doubts he’s successful.

Her expression says enough, but, “I’m dealing with it,” she says, before her brows draw together, worry creasing her smiling features. He wonders suddenly how bad he looks. “How are you feeling?”

“Not seasick,” Shanks quips, and thinks she might have pinched him, if his entire appearance hadn’t suggested it might take him down.

“Shanks!” comes Luffy’s shout then, no crown on his head but the authority of a king thrown about him without apology, as though it’s always been his to have, no matter the sea, or the ship under his feet. Shanks spies another cutlet in his hand, seeming conjured from thin air. “Let’s have a party!”

“Did you leave anything in the larder for us to actually throw one?” he ask, to which he receives a grin that doesn’t manage to be convincingly regretful, although he doubts Luffy is making much of an effort.

“There’s booze,” Ben says.

Shanks grins. “Good enough for me. I’ve never needed anything else.” A glance at Makino then. “Well. Maybe one thing.”

“Is he always this sentimental when he’s hopped up on meds?” Yasopp asks her.

“He’s worse when he’s drunk,” she says. “He’ll sing.”

Shanks has a mind to tell her that she doesn’t sound even remotely upset about the fact, when Yasopp says, “As much as I’d like to see the effect of that combination, you better not be mixing poisons tonight, Cap. Doc’s orders. It’s probably for the best, too. You look like a glass of the wrong stuff would do you in.” A clap to his shoulder follows, and the choking wheeze that pulls from him renders any protest he might have managed obsolete.

“Yeah, you’re not looking so good, Boss,” comes the murmured agreement, before there are more chiming in—

“Like death warmed up.”

“I think death would find that comparison insulting.”

“Good thing she didn’t catch sight of him before she came aboard—she might have turned the ship around and gone back.”

“Thanks, guys,” Shanks says. “I can feel the love. Really.”

Stepping up beside them, Ben slides Makino a look, cigarette lit and smile in place. Shanks is tempted to call him out for looking so unabashedly _pleased._ “He’s your problem now,” Ben tells her. “Good luck getting him back into bed.”

Oh, he has a suggestive remark ready for that, and is about to offer it when, “I’ve never had any difficulties where that’s concerned,” Makino says, wholly demure, and the startled laugh that drags from him is too loud for his body to take, but the pain has never been easier to bear.

Garp’s sigh sounds twice as old as he is. “I didn’t need to hear that,” he tells the baby. Then to Ben, “Where’s the booze?”

Ben nods to the galley, and Garp spares Shanks a last, warning look before striding off down the deck, the baby cooing in delight at the mainmast rising into the skies above, an uncluttered expanse touching the horizon on all sides.

Shanks watches him go, watches his son, and, “I feel like I’m still waiting for that punch,” he says, but when he looks at Makino there’s no clever remark to greet him, just her eyes, large and dark and fixed on him, like there’s nothing else and the sea beyond the bow doesn’t even exist.

The deck around them clears, the galley filling up instead, noise and laughter and people all the way to the brim. And he’s never in his life turned down a party, life-threatening injuries aside, but suddenly it’s all a little too much, the events of the past half hour having taken as much as they’d given, leaving him suddenly, unbearably tired.

As though having followed the path of his thoughts, “Bed,” Makino says, with a tug at his hand.

“Yeah,” Shanks says, acquiescence surrendered with a breath, and watches as worry flickers across her face. “What?”

“You’re not going to put up a fight?”

The fact that she looks so genuinely concerned by the fact makes him wonder just how insufferable he usually is, but his chagrin slips through his fingers before he can catch it, replaced with a sudden swell of fondness.

Thumb curved around her knuckles in lieu of a kiss, “I would, but you’re here, and that gives me plenty incentive,” he says, but his attempted suggestiveness is ruined by the honest marvel that’s crept into his voice, and, “You’re  _here_ ,” he repeats, almost to himself.

Her look softens, worry smoothing over with familiar longing. “It’s a little hard to believe.”

His breath leaves him, a not-quite-a-laugh. “You’re telling me.” And he feels it then, the full weight of that realisation; feels suddenly too much, and he’s too warm, the sun and the fever burning through his skin, and the warmth pushing up beneath it that has nothing to do with his wounds.

Teasing feels beyond him, but he grasps for it, anyway, needing suddenly a familiar foothold. “Couldn’t wait, huh? I’ve been told I’m irresistible, but I had no idea just how much.”

Tears spilling over, Makino doesn’t bother wiping them away, and her smile trembles when she offers it. And it’s meant to answer his teasing in turn, Shanks knows, but there’s a twinge too much honesty in her voice when she says, thickly, “I don’t know how I held out this long.”

Touching his fingers to her cheek finds it warm, and she leans into the caress, her eyes slipping shut. “That’s some will you’ve got,” Shanks agrees, watching her. And maybe it isn’t so strange that she is here, on this sea; he knows better than most that  _will_  manifests in different ways, and different strengths. “But it’s a lot of sea to cross, for one man,” he adds. Because even knowing her strengths, all that kindness, all that stubborn will, it is still a feat, wrapping his head around it—the fact that she did, for him.

Opening her eyes, she looks at him, cheek tucked into the cup of his palm. And he finds the whole voyage on her face, sea kings and prevailing seasickness and miles and miles of distance between her sea and his, but she’d covered it all, and, “I’d do it again,” Makino says simply, sunburned cheeks lifting with a smile that holds more patience than he’s ever deserved from anyone, least of all from her.

He doesn’t have a comeback to that—feels winded just from looking at her, standing on the deck of his ship, like she’s never belonged anywhere else.

“The party’s started,” she says then, with a glance in the direction of where the others have gone. Her next look shows her eyes glittering, and not from tears this time. “We could move your bunk into the galley. Being bedridden never stopped you. When you lost your arm, you tried to throw a party from your sickbed.”

His laugh is soft. “Did I really? I have no memory of this.”

“I’m not surprised. You were mostly out of it, the first two days.” Her gaze flickers to his chest, some of her humour bleeding out of her smile, and he wonders then, what Garp had told her—wonders how much Garp had even known of his condition, when he’d brought her the news.

The touch of her fingers over the bandages is unbearably light. Shanks has the sudden impulse to push back against her hand. “You’d try to throw a party out cold, if you could,” Makino murmurs.

He thinks he might tell her that he’s never desired a party less—or rather, that in this moment he’s never wanted anything more than his cabin, and  _her_ ; the unique quiet that’s hers and the circle of her arms, but from the look on her face, Shanks suspects she might already have guessed.

His hand dropping from her cheek, he seeks her fingers; the tender arch of her knuckles, white under her skin. “There’s an obscenely old bottle of scotch in my cabin,” he says. “Like, void-century old. I was saving it for when I came back.” Like the scotch, it’s an old thing, that tradition—her waiting, him returning, and a bottle shared between them when they come together. And even if he can do without the waiting, he likes the return—or perhaps more accurately, he likes the coming-together, in whatever capacity, although this might be his favourite so far.

“You’re not allowed to drink,” Makino reminds him, but her smile belies the soft reprimand she tries for.

“Maybe not,” Shanks agrees, grin widening. “But  _you_  are. And you’re delightful when you drink.”

“A whole bottle to myself?” she laughs. “I can barely get through three glasses at my best, and that’s when I haven’t been throwing up all day beforehand.”

“For the woman who braved a whole sea,” Shanks says, “I don’t think a bottle should be much of a challenge.”

The duck of her head isn’t quick enough to hide her pleasure in the pride he doesn’t even bother tempering, and, “Come on,” he tells her, fingers closing around hers, tucking them into his palm. A kiss to her hair has her leaning closer, and it’s an effort not to surrender some of his weight for her to bear. “We’ll save the bottle, but there’s a bunk calling my name.” Then, finding her eyes, “Unless you’d rather be the one calling it?” he purrs. “Give me a minute, and I’ll be good to go. I’m gaining a second wind.”

Makino laughs, chest heaving with it, as though for breath; as though they’re one and the same, and gives him a gentle push when he tugs her in the direction of his cabin. “Some things never change,” she sighs, cheek pressed against his shoulder.

Shanks smiles. “No,” he says, looking down at her, sea-touched with freckles and salt in her hair, green bleeding gold at the roots. Same girl, different sea, but he’d want her on all of them—would want her, more than the sea and all the freedom on it, because there’s freedom in that choice, and he doubts it’s much of a secret that he’s made it, but he tells her, anyway.

“Never that.”

 


End file.
